Synthesis and Improvement of Degree of Substitution and Characterization of Carboxymethylcellulose from Cotton Fuzz

Abstract

This research project aims to utilize cotton fuzz for the synthesis of carboxymethylcelluose (CMC). Cellulose was isolated from wasteful cotton fuzz with sodium hydroxide (NaOH), and then converted to commercially valuable CMC material by etherification reaction using monochloroacetic acid (MCAA) as etherifying agent, in the presence of NaOH. Many conditions that influence the course of the conventional etherification reaction were kept constant. These conditions were the weight of cellulose (5g), weight of MCAA (5g), and the reaction temperature (55 C). However, the solvent (isopropanol) was replaced with a cheaper and less hazardous one (ethanol). In addition various amounts of sodium chloride (NaCl) were introduced to the reaction mixture to study its effect in the degree of substitution (DS). The optimum amount of NaCl needed to produce CMC of high DS value (0.845) was found to be 10 g. The synthesized CMC material was characterized by FT-IR and it was found to be comparable to the commercial CMC materials. This study clearly showed that the biomass cotton fuzz is promising source of cellulose for the production of, commercially, valuable CMC material with high DS value.